Food safety issues, compliance in fisheries stressed

FE Report Fisheries and Livestock Minister Abdul Latif Biswas stressed the need for ensuring food safety and compliance in fisheries sector in a bid to uphold the image of the local quality products in the global market. "Bangladesh has improved its testing method resulting in the recent withdrawal of 20 per cent mandatory testing requirements by the European Union (EU)," the minister said. "It is a great achievement for Bangladesh," Mr Biswas said while speaking as the chief guest at the launching ceremony of the BEST-BFQ website at a seminar on 'Emerging Food Safety Issues and Compliance in Fisheries Sector of Bangladesh' held in the city Sunday. The lifting of the testing requirements comes into effect after the EU FVO team found the developments that the country has made, he said adding it has removed the barriers of export and will increase the exports to EU. The BEST-BFQ (Better Work and Standards Programme-Better Fisheries Quality) website www.best-bfq.org is introduced in a bid to make all global seafood-related information and improvements being achieved and carried out in Bangladesh available. Even though there have been many developments and improved food safety systems along the shrimp supply chain over the last few years, it was not possible to disseminate the development programmes to the stakeholders - both domestic and foreign. The website will help both the buyers and the consumers to know about seafood products from Bangladesh and their safety through it, the organisers said. The number of rapid alerts from EU has also decreased due to the massive programmes taken up by the government to remove harmful chemicals and medicines from shrimp and fish farms, the minister said. The number of rapid alerts decreased to only four in 2011 which was seven in 2010 and 50 in 2009, he said. "There is no alternative but to follow the international guidelines of food safety to introduce a safe production management system through good aquaculture practice among the farmers," he added. Bangladesh needs to further strengthen implementation and monitoring of food safety programmes as it has a very good set of risk-based legislative framework, said Shrimp Technical Adviser of BEST-BFQ, UNIDO, TS Shetty while presenting his key-note paper. "An effective linkage between the government and the food business operators is very essential," he said adding that the future of the seafood lies on the partnership between the industry and the government with a complete understanding between the industry and the community to make the sector sustainable. The project is aimed at increasing export of fish and fish products funded by EU-UNIDO (United Nations Industrial Development Organisation), he said. Ujjwal Bikas Dutta, Secretary, and Shamsul Kibria, Joint Secretary of Ministry of Fisheries and Livestock, Syed Arif Azad, Director General of Department of Fisheries, David Holbourne, Chief Technical Adviser of UNIDO and Milko van Gool, Counsellor and Head of Cooperation for EU Delegation in Bangladesh, among others, were present in the programme.